


The Birth of Tragedy (And Other Writings)

by kaijuvenom



Category: Gotham (TV)
Genre: Character Study, Ed is having a moment here, Established Relationship, Existential Crisis, M/M, Season/Series 03, cheesy metaphors, gratuitous mentions of philosophical dilemas, when Oswald is the mayor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-01
Updated: 2019-09-01
Packaged: 2020-10-04 12:14:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,312
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20470853
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kaijuvenom/pseuds/kaijuvenom
Summary: In some remote corner of the universe, flickering in the light of the countless solar systems into which it had been poured, there was once a planet on which clever animals invented cognition. It was the most arrogant minute in the history of the universe, but a minute was all it was. After nature had drawn just a few more breaths, the planet froze and all the clever animals had to die.





	The Birth of Tragedy (And Other Writings)

**Author's Note:**

> basically I'm having a crisis so to get through it, I put it on Ed Nygma and wrote this in about thirty minutes-an hour.

In some remote corner of the universe, flickering in the light of the countless solar systems into which it had been poured, there was once a planet on which clever animals invented cognition. It was the most arrogant minute in the history of the universe, but a minute was all it was. After nature had drawn just a few more breaths, the planet froze and all the clever animals had to die.

A fable like this could be invented, and yet it would still not give a satisfactory illustration of just how pitiful, how insubstantial, how pointless and arbitrary human's intellect looks within nature. Beyond human life, this intellect has no further mission. There were eternities when it did not exist, and when it has disappeared again, nothing will have happened. This intellect exists as nothing more than a reason for humans not to flee existence as quickly as did Lessing's infant son.

Ed had convinced himself he knew what he was doing, he knew why he did things, he had reasons and he used logic before making any decisions. And yet, he still felt like he didn’t know anything. Oswald had told him repeatedly he was brilliant, he was the smartest man in Gotham, that he admired Ed more than he had admired anyone else, his resilience and courage, levelheadedness. Oswald was always the first to boost Ed’s ego, to keep him from sinking too low even if he didn’t realize he was doing it. 

But the thing was… Ed didn’t truly believe he was smart. Just that he retained information and could occasionally spew it out in a way that was helpful. 

If someone hides something behind a bush, looks for it in the same place and finds it there, his seeking and finding is nothing much to boast about; but this, as Edward had tried to explain during one particularly bad night spent drinking in the living room of Oswald’s mansion as Oswald sat across from him on the couch, was exactly how things were as far as seeking and finding of the ‘truth’. 

“If I…” Ed swallowed, holding up a finger to indicate a pause as he tilted his glass up and drained the rest of the wine from it before setting it back down and continuing his speech, “if I create the definition of a mammal and then discover a camel and go-” he waved his arm dramatically, nearly smacking Oswald in the face, “‘Look, a mammal!’, then… yeah, I discovered a truth.”

Oswald squinted, trying to follow along, swaying a little as he held his half full wine glass at a precarious angle. 

“But it’s— it’s limited. It’s human. It’s not true because it’s true. It’s true because a human said it was. It’s not true in the way that… the fact that mercury becomes a liquid at a certain temperature is, it’s true in a way that’s more about… perception. Human error. It’s not about understanding things, it’s about putting things in the world in different boxes to make them comparable to humanity. It’s- it’s vain is what it is. Humans think they’re so much… much better than everything else. All because we create categories and then put things in the categories we’ve created. Why do we even need categories to begin with, it’s- it’s-” Ed lost momentum after that, just making vague hand gestures to better emphasize the point he wasn’t sure he had been trying to make. 

***

“We believe that when we speak of trees, colors, snow, and flowers, we have knowledge of the things themselves, and yet we possess only metaphors of things which in no way correspond to the original entities.”

Oswald blinked, looking up from his work at the sound of Ed’s voice. “Is this a riddle?” He asked, a valid question, in Ed’s opinion, but he shook his head.

“No. A quote. Friedrich Nietzsche, 1873, _On Truth and Lying in a Non-Moral Sense_.” 

There was a short silence as Oswald attempted to think of a response other than, ‘why are you quoting dead German philosophers at me, Edward?’ And was unable to come up with anything, so Ed filled the silence. 

He sat on the edge of Oswald’s desk, picking up two ballpoint pens, one of which had been in Oswald’s hand at the time. “We know that no two things are really exactly the same, like these two pens. But we also know that by calling both of these pens, we’re dropping their differences, temporarily forgetting about what makes each one different. So then we’re left with what? We have these categories, but we can’t really say what fits into them. We can call someone honest, and when we ask why someone was honest, the answer is ‘because of his honesty’. And the reason a pen is a pen is because it is a pen.” 

Oswald just smiled lightly and shook his head. “You’re too smart for me, Edward.” 

He didn’t understand the uncertainty brewing in Ed, he didn’t understand the obsession his partner had to find the _truth, _whatever that truth was. Maybe that was for the best, and, as Edward thought about it more, it probably was. Oswald was smart, but he didn’t concern himself with philosophy or asking unnecessary questions, he simply worked with things the way they were and always came out on top. Edward, on the other hand, had to question every decision, every little thing that occurred. That was likely why they worked so well together, Ed thought too much, and Oswald only thought as much as he felt he should, mostly relying on aesthetics to get him through life. 

Ed didn’t much care for aesthetics, of course he appreciated art, theatrics, et cetera, but there was always something more. Something deeper, anything and everything created by humans was made with an ulterior motive, a hidden, secret meaning that Ed for some reason felt dedicated to finding out. 

It was an age old question; one presented in every philosophy classroom Ed had ever attended at university. A man of intuition and a man of reason stand side by side, both wishing to rule over the world. Who wins?

The man of aesthetics is as unreasonable as the other is unartistic, and when he suffers, he suffers more severely and more often, not learning from his mistakes, while the stoic learns from the past, governs himself by logical concepts. But the man of aesthetics knows happiness, he knows love and beauty, and doesn’t waste away asking the same questions and never receiving answers to them. The man of reason doesn’t wear a twitching, mobile, human face, but instead a mask, he doesn’t shout or even change his tone of voice.

The question remains. Who prevails over the other?

Ed had thought himself clever when he’d innocently suggested, the first time this question had been posed, _What if they worked together_?, but apparently that wasn’t an option in this hypothetical scenario. But it wasn’t hypothetical anymore, he and Oswald were two halves of something that could rule the world, one half rational and one half emotional, and for all of Ed’s overthinking and questioning of things that really didn’t need to be questioned or thought about at all, he couldn’t think of a way for this to go wrong. It was the perfect scenario, the perfect combination of strength and weaknesses. If soulmates existed, Ed knew (or at least, knew as well as he could know anything for sure) that Oswald would be his, reminding him that he was human, prone to error and irrational thoughts, just as Ed would always be by his side, grounding him. Oswald was the kite, floating high into the sky, and Ed was the string, holding him safely, keeping him from the danger of floating away into nothingness. Together, they could rule the world, accomplish anything they wanted. 

**Author's Note:**

> Twitter: @kaijuvenom


End file.
